Friends First
by Frozen in Idaho
Summary: Every Soul in the Soul Society has been there before. What if Azien and Ichigo had meet before Azien was in the Shinigami Academy. Not only did they meet they were friends. What lengths will Azien go to when the only friend he has ever had dies.
1. Chapter 1

The little boy opened his eyes to find he didn't know where he was any more. He tried to remember who he was or where he had come from but all he could remember was a faint voice telling him to protect. Looking around he found himself in a village, with people all around him looking sullen. Pushing up from the ground, he stood. A man nearby spared him a glance before going back to starting at the ground. He found himself beginning to walk. He felt something drawing him, it was hard to explain but it was like a light was drawing him closer. His eyes remained focused on that light. He didn't notice how far he traveled or the occasional thug that would turn their eyes on him. Nor did he notice as the thugs would try and approach him only to fall down to the ground. He also didn't notice that even normal people who got close to him also suffered from the same fate.

When he finally came to his destination he found himself looking at a small lean to that if he so much as blew on would fall over. Reaching out his small hand he gave a light tap on the tree holding up the lean to. He held his breath as he waited to see what would happen.

It was a moment before a boy stepped out. The boy stood up, revealing that he was tall and lanky with shaggy brown hair falling in his eyes. The boy seemed to squint as if trying to see who was knocking. "Who's there?" The boy said in a growl.

"I am!" Said the little boy.

The boy turned his eyes down to where the little boy was and growled back, "Who are you?"

The little boy paused a moment before answering, "I don't know who I am."

The bigger boy glowered, "You must be new. Don't go knocking on the first door you see!" He went to go back into his house before the little boy grabbed his shirt.

"But you aren't the first door I saw."

"Don't go knocking on every door you see!" He snapped back as he tried to pull his shirt back but found that he couldn't.

"But you're the first door I knocked on!"

He stopped trying to get his shirt back as he turned to look at the boy. "Then why did you knock on mine?" He growled.

"I just followed the light and it led me to you!"

The older boy tried to look around but didn't see any light. "There is no light kid. Go bother someone else." Once again he turned to go back into his house.

"There is too a light!" He looked back to see the boy looking up at him. The boy raised his hand as if he was touching something the other couldn't see. "It's all around you. It's very pretty."

The older boy froze. A light? He couldn't mean. . . After a moment of concentration he lowered his spiritual pressure.

"Wow your light just got dimmer!"

Slowly the boy turned around to face the younger boy. "Why did you come here?"

The little boy looked up at his face. "I felt that I needed to find the light!" The older boy looked puzzled as he looked down at the young child. "What's your name!?"

"Aizen." He answered absentmindedly. "Follow me boy." With that he took off down the street. He could sense the younger boy following behind him. It was about time for the shinigami to be making there patrols. Aizen went to where he knew they would be. Pausing just out of sight he turned back to the boy. "Look down the street and tell me if you see any lights."

The boy did as commanded. "There are a couple of faint lights, but nothing brighter than yours." He looked back at Aizen with a confused look.

"Wait another minute."

Shrugging he went back to looking down the street. Aizen knew the moment the shinigami crossed the road because the crowd went silent. He waited tell they were gone before asking his question. "What about them did they have a light?"

The boy turned back to look at him before shrugging and looking back down the alley. "It was brighter than the others but still not as nice as yours."

Aizen began to smile, well well well look what he had found. "Do you want to live with me?"

The boy turned back, "Really, can I?!"

"Yes."

The boy began to jump up and down and cry out in joy!

Aizen turned to leave but quickly found a little hand in his. Looking down he saw the boy holding his hand and humming. When he went to pull his hand out he found he couldn't. Aizen rolled his eyes and kept walking.

He found that holding the boy's hand wasn't so bad. The boy made it a point to steer Aizen out if the path of potential hazards and people. Even though Aizen had been in this forsaken place for years he still would trip over things that people left in the street, but he refused to stare at his feet as he walked like everyone else did. The boy almost seemed to be doing it unconsciously.

His mind was wandering when all of a sudden he felt the boy jerk him so a stop. "What. . . .?"

"Oh boy, look what we have here!" There was a chorus of laughter.

Aizen ground his teeth. It was them. Kyan and his gaggle of thugs.

"My my my if it is our neighborhood blind girl, and what is this? Do you have a suitor?"

"Back off Kyan." Aizen found his voice drop into a low ominous tone.

"Oh look boys, our little girlfriend here is trying to be tough for her man!"

"Aizen's not a girl." The little boy spoke up.

The group went silent for a moment, "Looks like your little suitor's got some backbone." Aizen kept his eyes focused on where he thought Kyan was. He felt him draw closer and held the boy's hand tighter. "Why lookie here, your suitor is actually quite the eye candy. I bet we could fetch a nice price for him."

Aizen let out a growl as he pulled the boy behind his back. "Leave him out of this." His tone fell flat.

"Oh feisty are you. I think it's time we teach you a lesson again." There was a sickening sound of laughter and his conies cried out in joy as they all surged towards them.

Aizen felt frustration rise. There wasn't anything he could do to fend all of them off. He raised his one hand to deflect a hit he knew was coming only to be hit from another direction. He felt the boy drop his hand as he tried to help. Moments later Aizen heard his cry as he was picked up and was being pulled away. He heard Kyan from somewhere to his left holler out, "Be careful with the merchandise, we won't get as much if you hurt his pretty face!"

Aizen almost bit his tongue as he went to yell out, but once again he was punched in the stomach.

The boy began screaming in earnest at the sight. With the sound Aizen was surprised to find a weight descend upon him. He hit his knees from the pressure but he found that Kyan's cronies also hit the ground but harder, and they began to cry in pain. Aizen found his vision turning to nothing but white. The sound of the scream continued even as the boy ran to Aizen and threw his arms around his neck.

The scream slowly faded to cries of anguish as he continued to cling to Aizen's neck. Aizen found that as his screams faded to tears that he was able to rise to his feet. Kyan and his cronies were whimpering on the ground. "Stay away from us if you know what is good for you!" He spat on the ground towards where he thought Kyan was before leaving with the boy still crying.

Aizen tripped and faltered several times on the way back to his house but he managed to keep his feet. He carefully entered his house before placing the boy down. Now that he could get a close look at the boy, Aizen realized he didn't look much younger than him, but with pitch black hair and large chocolate brown eyes the boy looked younger.

Tears still running down his face the by looked up at Aizen, "Are you okay?"

Aizen was startled for a moment, "I'm okay."

The boy began to rub his eyes as if trying to dry them, "I was so scared, they were hitting you so much and I just wanted to help, but I didn't know how."

Aizen made soothing sounds to the younger boy as he tried to help him calm down. "I have something that might make you feel better."

The boy looked up with red eyes, "What?"

Azien gave a smile, "I've come up with a name for you."

The boy looked puzzled, "huh?"

"You said before that you don't remember who you are so I thought you would like a name." The boy's eyes got big as he stared at him and began to empathetically nod his head.

Aizen's grin grew, "I think the best name for you would be Shiro. Your power is so strong all I could see was white earlier."

Shiro nodded his head as he spoke the name aloud. "Shiro. I like that! Thank you Aizen!" He leaped forward and gave him a hug.

"Welcome to the soul society Shiro."


	2. Chapter 2 Glasses

I do not own Bleach.

Chapter Two: Glasses

Shiro peaked out from behind the wall watching the moving crowd in front of him. His trained eyes looked for the flash of metal that he knew would come. It was hard to block out the lights that the people in the street gave off. Aizen had been working with him to block it out and it kind of helped, but the people in the 10th district gave off a lot more light than the people from his own district.

He had been in the soul society, as Aizen called this place, for several months. Aizen had been patient with him and had taught him how to not only dim the lights he saw, but also that he could manipulate his own spiritual pressure. He was even learning to bend his own light so that others saw him differently. That was how he had been able to get into the 10th district without being turned away as a street rat.

There it was! In a flash Shiro dove into the road, somersaulting across as his hand shot out to grab the coin that had been dropped. He heard the screams of the ladies as they saw him. That was one of the things about him being able to control his own spiritual energy: if anything distracted him, his allusions would drop. Rolling the rest of the way to his feet, he got up and ran.

He heard the cries for a Shinigami follow behind him. His eyes quickly scanned the surrounding area for a place to hide. That was one of the things he had become really good at. Aizen seemed to have this dislike for the Shinigami and tried to avoid them at all cost. Aizen had their patrols memorized, but about once a month they would do a random patrol that would catch Aizen by surprise, and with his bad sight, Shiro had taken it upon himself to make sure that they were well hidden.

His eyes quickly locked on a gap that was just big enough for his small body. Turning sideways, he worked his way through to come out on the other side, once again looking like he belonged here. Keeping his pace even and slow like the others around him, he moved towards the store that he had been saving money to go into.

He quickly checked to make sure everyone was still looking at him like he belonged before stepping into the store in the eighth district. The man behind the counter had a pleasant light around him, and when he looked up he was startled to see a gangly preteen standing in front of him.

"Excuse me, Sir, but I have heard that this place makes the best glasses. Is that true?" Shiro asked.

The man's face lit up in a bright smile. "Yes it is! Are the glasses for you?"

Shiro's smile grew. "No sir, they are for a friend of mine who couldn't come."

The man smiled down, "Well that makes it a little hard for me to find glasses for him then. Would you be able to bring him in?"

Shiro shook his head; if Aizen knew he was here, he would be in so much trouble. After the first day, other than when they went on walks together, Aizen tended to leave Shiro behind as he went out to make money, and had told Shiro repeatedly not to leave their house without him. "He is too sick to come, and I wanted to make them a gift for him."

The man gave a sad smile as he shook his head. "I would need to see him to see the type of glasses he would need."

"What if I told you about how well he saw?"

The man was taken aback. "Well, it would depend on how much information you had, but even then they wouldn't be perfect."

With that Shiro smiled. He had been watching Aizen closely and had even asked him questions to the point that Shiro could tell what Aizen could and couldn't see. He began to recite all that he knew.

The man's eyes got wide as he talked, and he told him to stop while he pulled out paper and ink and began to record what Shiro said. When Shiro finished, the man was looking the paper up and down. "You must spend a lot of time with your friend to know all of this."

Shiro gave a huge nod. "Yep! He is my best friend!"

"Well, based off what you gave me, I might be able to find a pair. It would work better if I had a piece of his spiritual pressure. . ."

Shiro held his shirt up. "He gave me this shirt. It was a gift. Would it have some of his spiritual pressure?"

The man pushed up his own glasses as he grabbed the corner of the shirt that was offered to him. "Well, it might. . ." As he looked at the shirt his eyes grew wide. There was such a strong spiritual pressure coming off the shirt. He looked at the boy again to find that he wasn't giving off a lot of spiritual pressure. This spiritual pressure must be from his friend. "Yes, this will work. Give me a moment." Running behind the counter he grabbed a spiritual pressure sampler. It was but a small tube that would hold spiritual pressure until he could put it into the glasses he made. Turning, he found that the boy had followed behind him. Bending down, he drew in some of the spiritual pressure of the shirt.

Unknown to him, not only had he taken some of Aizen's spiritual pressure but also some of Shiro's hidden spiritual pressure as well. The colors in the sampler quickly began to merge until they became a bright blue-violet that shined.

Shiro's eyes grew wide at the color. He had never seen the light of spiritual pressure be purple before. As his hand reached out to touch it, the owner of the shop moved his hand to hold the sampler before his eyes.

"That's strange. I have never seen it do that before." He continued to turn it this way and that. "I've never seen it have a color before." When he felt a tug on his robes, he looked down to see the boy. "Oh, I'm sorry. We were making some glasses for your friend, right? I will be right back." With that he walked into the backroom. Moments after he passed through, he stuck his head out again. "I shouldn't be long; feel free to look around for a bit."

Shiro turned around and walked over to one of the seats, before hiding behind it to allow his disguise he had carefully crafted with his spiritual energy to fall away. Even though he had been working on it for a long time and it was how he had been able to go look for money in the upper districts, he found it incredibly difficult to maintain. He allowed his spiritual pressure to run wide as he sat there waiting for the man to come back. It felt good to just let his spiritual energy run wide. It took so much energy to hold it in like Aizen had taught him, and insisted that he do all the time so as not to draw notice from the Shinigami. Shiro found that the better he got at controlling his spiritual energy, the more it seemed to slow down his growth. He had grown a little when he had first gotten here, but he seemed to have stopped since. He couldn't remember anything from his life before coming to the soul society, but since his first month when his hair had seemed to grow like a weed it had stopped. His train of thought was cut off as he heard the sound of footsteps coming back. He quickly put his disguise back up just as the store owner came back into the room and paused, looking confused for a moment.

Shiro quickly jumped up, surprising the man. "Oh, there you are. I have your glasses here for you." He gave a chuckle as the boy ran up to him, smiling again. "You're lucky I had a pair of glasses that if I didn't know better, I would have thought had been made for your friend." He carefully handed the glasses to the boy. "Are they to your satisfaction?"

Shiro nodded with satisfaction. They were simple brown square frames. "I'll take them. How much do they cost?" Shiro had scouted out the shop awhile back to make sure he would have enough and as the older man listed the price his smile grew. He would still have extra money. Pulling out all the painstakingly collected money, he placed each coin in the other man's hands. When the transaction was complete, Shiro skipped out of the store with the glasses held carefully in his hands.

What happened next, Shiro still wasn't sure how it had happened. Maybe he had been so happy that he wasn't paying attention, or maybe the other party had simply stepped out at the wrong time. All he knew was that he ran smack into a solid object that caused his to fall to the ground. He managed to protect Aizen's new glasses as he fell, but when he looked up, what he saw made him speechless. It was an older man with a kind face and long white hair, some it falling in his face. He was wearing a large white robe that was open over what appeared it be a black robe tied with a white sash. What made Shiro stop though was the overwhelming brightness, like the color yellow, that was radiating from the man. It was even brighter than Aizen's was. Shiro could feel himself being pressed down. The pressure was so great that he found himself unconsciously releasing his own spiritual pressure to counteract the other man's. The man's eyes got wide at this, and he looked Shiro up and down while he extended his hand out to him.

"Are you okay little one?" The man said.


End file.
